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Jumper
The idea of a teenager suddenly finding himself endowed with a supernatural
ability to transport himself and anyone he holds close to anywhere on the
planet may ring the Spider-man button for unoriginality, but with Hayden
Christensen as that fortunate person and Rachel Bilson as the girlfriend he's
been trying so hard to impress, there could be some entertainment in store
for the undemanding sci-fi comic book-style fan.
Unfortunately, however, the patience to see where this will go goes
unrewarded as the creative team struggles to unleash some creativity and, by
mid way, you wish the jumper were you. Teleporting yourself to the outer
lobby would be far enough.
Samuel L. Jackson is Roland, a Paladin sworn to kill any jumper he may
discover. He's relentless at it but director Doug Liman would have you buy
into the notion that jumper David Rice (Christensen) is special in some way
while failing to define what makes him so, save for the lad's ability to
defeat his nemesis time and time again, ad infinitum.
The scenario is peppered with explosive disappearances and reappearances
until you can be sure the CGI crew could do it in their collective sleep.
It starts with a purpose--David rebelling at his dumb bully of a dad by
teleporting into a bank vault and setting himself up in high style. A return
to school pays off by reigniting the simmering infatuation with his
girlfriend Millie Harris (Rachel Bilson) and fulfilling her dream of
traveling--first stop Rome, Italy. There, he encounters Griffin (Jamie
Bell), a fellow jumper who explains how he fits into the battle between
Jumpers and Paladins. David studiously keeps it all from Millie and, as much
moving around as there is, there's damned little movement in the
relationship, or the plot.
Painfully dull but at least there's Bilson to look at. Christensen, who was
so poor in the Star Wars prequels shows a better grasp of character
fulfillment here. Diane Ladd makes an appearance as David's long gone mother
and this stunning beauty never looked better. You just have to sit through
too much to make the chance to see her worthwhile.
Now available on DVD. (Click title above)

Cinema Signal:
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The Visitor
Gentle, realistic storytelling to a fault, this small, contained movie has,
as one of its main virtues, a perfect cast, led by character actor Richard
Jenkins ("Six Feet Under," HBO) in a rare starring role. He not only knows
what to do with the opportunity, he makes it a shining example of
credibility.
Walter Vale (Jenkins) is a 62-year old widower who has purportedly written
three books, teaches economics in a Connecticut college and keeps a New York
apartment. But he's essentially sleepwalking through what, at one time, were
his passions. He's aware of his lassitude and tries his hand at classical
piano, for which he has no real talent.
When a school assignment to deliver a paper at a conference brings him back
to Manhattan, he's stunned to find Tarek (Haaz Sleiman), a Syrian man and
Zainab (Danai Gurira), a Senegalese woman--two perfect strangers--enjoying
the comforts of his apartment. The couple, with illegal status in the
country, have been victimized in a real estate scam and have no options for
shelter except the streets. Walter, touched by their plight and not
indifferent to his need for companionship, allows them to stay.
His empathy is rewarded with Tarek's joyful friendship and drum lessons when
Walter shows an interest in the percussion rhythms he creates at a club gig.
Soon Walter has found a niche that fulfills his emotional and musical needs.
His new bonds, however, are put to the test when Tarek is arrested and put
in a detention facility for undocumented people awaiting final resolution,
which could mean deportation. And, then, when Tarek's beautiful Syrian
mother Mouna (Hiam Abbass) shows up, Walter's involvements take an even
deeper aspect.
Though this is surefire material for the heartstrings and for the
sentimentally inclined, there are stretches in auteur Tom McCarthy's story
that defy staying awake. The constancy of its true-to-life dimensions and
pacing, however, makes it worth sticking to, with such sypathetic people
holding your interest and admiration.

Cinema Signal:
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The Strangers
In about as simple a horror film premise as a high school screenwriting
student might come up with, this night out with Scott Speedman ("Felicity,"
"Anamorph") and Liv Tyler
("The Lord of the Rings" series) hits the standard horror
buttons to ensure a spectrum of shocks so that inveterate genre fans won't
won't be demanding their money back. First time writer-director Bryan
Bertino, borrowing almost to the point of plagiarism from Michael Haneke's
1997 or his 2007 version of "Funny Games," had the wisdom to cast his two leads for
their inherent sympathetic qualities which, along with a generically spooky
score by tomandandy, immeasurably hightens the simplistic design of the fright
formula.
James Hoyt (Speedman) and Kristen McKay (Tyler) are vacationing together in
the Hoyt family's remote country house. While they are clearly in love, his
presentation to her of a wedding ring, accompanied by rose petals and
champagne, meets with rejection on the inexplicable basis of "I'm not ready."
So, after a night out they return to the homestead where, as they are
engaging in bedroom foreplay, an outlandishly loud knock on the front door
kills the mood outright. James cracks the door to find a girl asking about
someone who doesn't live there. Sorry. Go away. Okay, back to the sheets?
Not so fast.
From there it's limited variations on a theme, bringing much nocturnal grief
in the form of incessant knocks, crashing sounds, appearances and
disappearances by this girl and a couple of nasty, masked friends who have
nothing better to do but terrorize the occupants. They proceed to
mysteriously gaining access inside the house, silently moving things around
to build fear, to incapacitating the cell phones, destroying James' car,
and worse.
In "Funny Games," a couple is trapped in their home and terrorized for
similarly inexplicable but clearly psychopathic reasons by two blond men. So,
gee, one wonders where Bertino conceived his idea. Giving him his due,
however, the carefully designed shocks are effective, despite being utterly
derivative. The main virtue of the exploitative drama is the chance to see
these two actors doing some nice work. Not Naomi Watts and Tim Roth, mind
you, but engaging, until the victimization reactions wear thin.

Cinema Signal:
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Poisoned by Polonium:
The Litvinenko File
Russian documentarian Andrei Nekrasov set out to document a limited group of
comrades who saw and had the courage to speak about the negative aspects of
Russian president Vladimir Putin's rule as a de facto dictator. For this
purpose, one of his featured interview subjects was none other than ex-KGB
agent Alexander "Sasha" Litvinenko. Never heard of him? Actually, you
probably have.
Before the film was completed, and after a lot of footage recorded
Litvinenko's case against the government and the murderous policies of its
security apparatus, the case of a Russian being poisoned by an intentional
dose of Polonium-210, a deadly radiation agent, was all over the
international news. It occured in London in 2006 and shocked the world.
That Russian was Alexander Litvinenko, silenced for his rebellious, outspoken
rages against the regime.
When that happened, filmmaker Nekrasov revamped his documentary to focus on
the political victim and what his assassination indicates as a new,
heightened level of danger for disaffected anti-Putinists. Undoubtedly, the
filmmaker thought that all his coverage of his outspoken subject before his
death would make for a powerful, amply recorded statement. Unfortunately, in
the cold light of objectivity, his film is bogged down by talking heads with
little to no familiarity and the difficulty of associating them in the
attempt to shed light.
Had I been consulted, I would have advised a liberal use of identification
titles when key people in the discussion reappear, to help the uninitiated
keep track of the significance behind their offerings of accusations and
detail. It would also help us judge their comparative weight in the
search for truth, even though a flow of charges, countercharges, theories,
suspicions and political positioning does not a revelation make. This
expose' isn't ready for prime time.
The taste of such criminal injustice is bitter. The appearance of Litvinenko's
beautiful widow is shattering. But the editing of the film lacks the touch of
a dramatist. The number of times we see Nekrasov himself suggests a wee bit
more self-promotion than necessary, handsome fellow that he is. In the end,
the outrage one must feel about this crime against an individual who
expressed human regard and decency is conveyed, and Nekrasov's dedication to
tell as much of the story as he can is more than appropriate and duly
recorded.

Cinema Signal:
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Finding Amanda
This unromantic comedy is something less than a sure bet. For some reason,
you get the impression that it doesn't live up to the promise of its
premise.
It revolves around Taylor Peters (Matthew Broderick), a compulsive gambler
who'll use any deception of his loving wife Lorraine (Maura Tierney) that
she'll accept if it means getting to Vegas, and lovely Amanda (Brittany
Snow), his niece who, it has been learned, is hooking there.
The promise of the piece resides in the chipper way Amanda is plying her
trade with the freedom to discuss it with her uncle openly. Snow has all the
beauty and feisty personality to pull this off as a farcical fantasy.
The underlying theme is to expose the various hues and colors of addiction and
how the effort of one to straighten out the other may have the effect of
making them stop lying to themselves (and everyone around them) about their
own problem.
Like said, a premise with promise. But Peter Tolan's direction is no more
sure of itself than his screenplay. Awkwardness in the writing and staging
plays through to the performances, which are as shaky as a first bet.
Broderick's laid back style sometimes seems to lack energy and, though he's
the right type for the story, his grappling with a character who is somewhere
between a sad sack and a selfish self-destructor, doesn't provide much of the
lift it needs. It must be added, however, that he has his comedic moments.
The funniest line comes when Amanda's live in boyfriend (or, should that be
boyfiend?) Greg (Peter Facinelli), a out-of-work cooling contractor,
threatens to kill Taylor if he tells Amanda he's had another woman in her
home. "How," Taylor asks, "you're going to refrigerate me to death?"
The mordant humor may be reason enough to catch this light wave of
situational entertainment but the real key to it is far and away the chance
to catch hot Snow making her way to stardom. It's hard to gauge her level of
talent from this, but she has all the benefit of looks to kill.

For more reviews, please use these links:
Cinema Signals Master List
Cinema Signals Alphabetical List
Movies in Brief, 2007)
Movies in Brief, 2008 1st Quarter
Movies in Brief, 2008 3rd Quarter